21.
“ The Creative Age is a wide open g ame .” —Richard Florida, The Rise of the Creative Class

22.
“ THE FUTURE BELONGS TO … SMALL POPULATIONS … WHO BUILD EMPIRES OF THE MIND … AND WHO IGNORE THE TEMPTATION OF—OR DO NOT HAVE THE OPTION OF—EXPLOITING NATURAL RESOURCES.” Source: Juan Enriquez/ As the Future Catches You

44.
A review of Jack and Suzy Welch’s Winning claims there are but two key differentiators that set GE “culture” apart from the herd: First : Separating financial forecasting and performance measurement. Performance measurement based, as it usually is, on budgeting leads to an epidemic of gaming the system. GE’s performance measurement is divorced from budgeting—and instead reflects how you do relative to your past performance and relative to competitors’ performance; i.e., it’s about how you actually do in the context of what happened in the real world, not as compared to a gamed-abstract plan developed last year. Second : Putting HR on a par with finance and marketing.

63.
“ In most companies, the Talent Review Process is a farce. At GE, Jack Welch and his two top HR people visit each division for a day. They review the top 20 to 50 people by name. They talk about Talent Pool strengthening issues . The Talent Review Process is a contact sport at GE; it has the intensity and the importance of the budget process at most companies.” —Ed Michaels

71.
“ No matter what the situation, [the great manager’s] first res p onse is alwa y s to think about the individual concerned and how thin g s can be arran g ed to hel p that individual ex p erience success .” —Marcus Buckingham, The One Thing You Need to Know

72.
“ Firms will not ‘manage the careers’ of their employees. The y will p rovide o pp ortunities to enable the em p lo y ee to develo p identit y and ada p tabilit y and thus be in char g e of his or her own career .” —Tim Hall et al., “The New Protean Career Contract ”

74.
“ The role of the Director is to create a space where the actors and actresses can become more than they’ve ever been before, more than they’ve dreamed of being .” —Robert Altman, Oscar acceptance speech

76.
“ One of the defining characteristics [of the change] is that it will be less driven by countries or corporations and more driven by real people. It will unleash unprecedented creativity, advancement of knowledge, and economic development. But at the same time, it will tend to undermine safety net systems and penalize the unskilled.” —Clyde Prestowitz, Three Billion New Capitalists

77.
“ If there is nothing very special about your work, no matter how hard you apply yourself you won’t get noticed, and that increasingly means you won’t get paid much either.” —Michael Goldhaber, Wired

82.
“ We believe companies can increase their market cap 50 percent in 3 years. Steve Macadam at Georgia-Pacific … changed 20 of his 40 box plant managers to put more talented, higher paid managers in charge. He increased profitability from $ 25 million to $ 80 million in 2 years.” —Ed Michaels, War for Talent

99.
“ My wife and I went to a [kindergarten] parent-teacher conference and were informed that our budding refrigerator artist, Christopher, would be receiving a grade of Unsatisfactory in art. We were shocked. How could any child—let alone our child—receive a poor grade in art at such a young age? His teacher informed us that he had refused to color within the lines, which was a state re q uirement for demonstratin g ‘ g rade-level motor skills .’ ” —Jordan Ayan, AHA!

102.
“ The organizations we created have become tyrants. They have taken control, holding us fettered, creating barriers that hinder rather than help our businesses. The lines that we drew on our neat organizational diagrams have turned into walls that no one can scale or penetrate or even peer over.” — Frank Lekanne Deprez & Ren é Tissen, Zero Space: Moving Beyond Organizational Limits

104.
“ It was much later that I realized Dad’s secret. He gained respect by giving it. He talked and listened to the fourth-grade kids in Spring Valley who shined shoes the same way he talked and listened to a bishop or a college president. He was seriously interested in who you were and what you had to say.” Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, Respect

105.
“ What creates trust, in the end, is the leader’s manifest res p ect for the followers.” — Jim O’Toole, Leading Change

119.
“ When assessing candidates, the first thing I looked for was energy and enthusiasm for execution. Does she talk about the thrill of g ettin g thin g s done, the obstacles overcome, the role her p eople p layed —or does she keep wandering back to strategy or philosophy?” —Larry Bossidy, Honeywell/AlliedSignal, in Execution

121.
“ Why focus on these late teens and twenty-somethings? Because the y are the first y oun g who are both in a position to change the world, and are actuall y doing so . … For the first time in history, children are more comfortable, knowledgeable and literate than their parents about an innovation central to society. … The Internet has triggered the first industrial revolution in history to be led by the young.” The Economist

127.
“ To be a leader in consumer products, it’s critical to have leaders who represent the population we serve.” —Steve Reinemund/PepsiCo

128.
“ We want our associate population to mirror our customer population at every level, from the executive suite all the way to the retail floor .” —Larry Johnston, CEO, Albertsons

129.
CM Prof Richard Florida on “Creative Capital ”: “You cannot get a technologically innovative place … unless it’s open to weirdness, eccentricity and difference.” Source: New York Times /06.01.2002

130.
“ Diverse groups of problem solvers—groups of people with diverse tools—consistently outperformed groups of the best and the brightest. If I formed two groups, one random (and therefore diverse) and one consisting of the best individual performers, the first group almost always did better. … Diversity trumped ability .” —Scott Page, The Difference: How the Power of Diversity Creates Better Groups, Firms, Schools, and Societies Diversity

131.
“ The Bottleneck Is at the Top of the Bottle” “Where are you likely to find people with the least diversity of experience, the largest investment in the past, and the greatest reverence for industry dogma: At the to p!” — Gary Hamel/ Harvard Business Review

135.
10 UNASSAILABLE REASONS WOMEN RULE Women make [all] the financial decisions. Women control [all] the wealth. Women [substantially] outlive men. Women start most of the new businesses. Women’s work force participation rates have soared worldwide. Women are closing in on “same pay for same job.” Women are penetrating senior ranks rapidly [even if the pace is slow for the corner office per se]. Women’s leadership strengths are exceptionally well aligned with new organizational effectiveness imperatives. Women are better salespersons than men. Women buy [almost] everything—commercial as well as consumer goods. So what exactly is the point of men ?

138.
Why Do I love Freaks? (1) Because when Anything Interesting happens … it was a freak who did it. (Period.) (2) Freaks are fun. (Freaks are also a pain.) (Freaks are never boring.) (3) We need freaks . Especially in freaky times. (Hint: These are freaky times, for you & me & the CIA & the Army & Avon.) (4) A critical mass of freaks-in-our-midst automatically make us-who-are-not-so-freaky at least somewhat more freaky. (Which is a Good Thing in freaky times—see immediately above.) (5) Freaks are the only (ONLY) ones who succeed—as in, make it into the history books. (6) Freaks keep us from falling into ruts. (If we listen to them.) (We seldom listen to them.) (Which is why most organizations are in ruts. Make that chasms.)

144.
“ The key difference between checkers and chess is that in checkers the pieces all move the same way, whereas in chess all the pieces move differently. … Discover what is uni q ue about each p erson and ca p italize on it .” —Marcus Buckingham, The One Thing You Need to Know

145.
“ The mediocre manager believes that most things are learnable and therefore that the essence of management is to identify ach person’s weaker areas and eradicate them. The great manager believes the opposite. He believes that the most influential qualities of a person are innate and therefore that the essence of management is to deploy these innate qualities as effectively as possible and so drive performance.” —Marcus Buckingham, The One Thing You Need to Know

150.
Organizing Genius / Warren Bennis and Patricia Ward Biederman “Groups become great only when everyone in them, leaders and members alike, is free to do his or her absolute best .” “The best thing a leader can do for a Great Group is to allow its members to discover their g reatness .”

151.
Leadershi p ’s Mt Everest! “ free to do his or her absolute best” … “allow its members to discover their greatness.”

152.
“ The organization would ultimately win not because it gave agents more money, but because it gave them a chance for better lives.” — Everybody Wins , Phil Harkins & Keith Hollihan

155.
“ You must realize that how you invest your human capital matters as much as how you invest your financial capital. Its rate of return determines your future options. Take a job for what it teaches you, not for what it pays. Instead of a potential employer asking, ‘Where do you see yourself in 5 years?’ you’ll ask, ‘If I invest my mental assets with you for 5 years, how much will they appreciate? How much will my portfolio of career options grow?’ ” Source: Stan Davis & Christopher Meyer, futureWEALTH

159.
The Top 5 “Revelations” Better talent wins. Talent management is my job as leader. Talented leaders are looking for the moon and stars. Over-deliver on people’s dreams – they are volunteers. Pump talent in at all levels, from all conceivable sources, all the time. Source: Ed Michaels et al., The War for Talent

165.
“ Management has a lot to do with answers. Leadership is a function of questions. And the first question for a leader always is: ‘ Who do we i ntend to be ?’ Not ‘What are we going to do?’ but ‘Who do we intend to be?’” —Max De Pree, Herman Miller

178.
“ Excellence can be obtained if you: ... care more than others think is wise; ... risk more than others think is safe; ... dream more than others think is practical; ... expect more than others think is possible.” Source: Anon. (Posted @ tompeters.com by K.Sriram, November 27, 2006 1:17 AM)

179.
&quot;Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in one pretty and well preserved piece, but to skid across the line broadside, thoroughly used up, worn out, leaking oil, shouting ‘ GERONIMO!’ ” — Bill McKenna, professional motorcycle racer ( Cycle magazine 02.1982)